


The One Where Bob and Patrick Live Together

by Bexless



Category: Fall Out Boy, My Chemical Romance
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-07-30
Updated: 2011-07-30
Packaged: 2017-10-21 23:47:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,271
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/231218
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bexless/pseuds/Bexless
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Set during the summer Bob and Patrick (canonically) lived together while recording their respective albums.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The One Where Bob and Patrick Live Together

**Author's Note:**

> For Overloved :) Thanks to Fvckofagun.

There are many things that Patrick likes about Bob’s apartment. It’s neat and clean and big enough that the two of them don’t get in each others’ way, but small enough that Patrick doesn’t feel like the last pill in the bottle. There’s always coffee, and the TV is huge, and it is blissfully, wonderfully, mercifully Pete-free.

Patrick *loves* Pete. Of course he does. That goes without saying. Pete is his best friend, his writing partner, his alter-ego. Pete is a genius and he’s crazy-sweet and he makes Patrick laugh more than anyone else alive, but sometimes? Sometimes Patrick just wants to hang out with someone who never needs to discuss existentialism in The Smurfs.

“I know what you mean, man.” Bob fishes around in the fridge for two beers. He opens both and hands one to Patrick. “I love Gerard to death, but like, I can only have so many conversations about the endless night sky. You know?”

“I really do.”

Bob goes through to the living room and Patrick follows. They watch Bring it On the way it was meant to be watched, in reverent silence while sitting at opposite ends of the sofa, without anyone chanting flawlessly along, or getting up to demonstrate their ability to high-kick.

Later, Patrick tries to help Bob clean up from dinner, but there seems to be a System that he’s not aware of, so he limits himself to rinsing out the beer bottles and placing them in Bob’s special recycling caddy by the door.

They say goodnight, and Patrick takes a shower that no-one tries to film, and gets in a bed that no-one else tries to climb into, and, because he’s put his phone on silent, he sleeps all the way through the night, uninterrupted.

It’s awesome.

***

So they get along great – they don’t spend too much time there anyway, and usually one of them is home early while the other is still holed up in the studio until ass o’clock, and, and Bob doesn’t smoke inside because of Patrick’s voice and Patrick tries really, really hard not to leave hair in the sink and it works.

They hang out with the other guys, of course. That weekend they all come over and sit out in Bob’s garden. Mikey and Pete immediately get involved in some elaborate game that seems to involve swapping items of clothing, and a tomato. Patrick doesn’t know.

Bob shows Frank his new water pressure cleaning jet…thing. Patrick doesn’t really get it – like, okay, once you’ve seen it clean one square of patio, you’ve seen it all, right?

Except Frank and Bob are really into it, like Frank keeps running around and finding new stuff to clean, and Bob sprays it and then they both ooh and aah over the ease, efficiency and convenience.

Joe puts Christina Aguilera on the stereo, and Patrick watches Ray eating the really expensive chocolate ice cream Bob has to buy from a store that’s like, a thousand miles away, and listens to Andy give him his Vegan Manifesto: Now with Added Wheatgrass, and Patrick thinks about how Bob’s toiletries are all lined up in a neat row in the bathroom and how weird he is about everyone taking their shoes off when they come in the apartment, and he turns to Gerard, who’s sitting next to him eating a raspberry popsicle. “You know – we’re not a particularly masculine bunch of dudes.”

Gerard smiles. His teeth, stained blue, are even more disturbing than usual. “Yeah,” he says happily.

Patrick waits, but Gerard doesn’t say anything else. So Patrick ventures, “Like – even Toro. But Bob’s a lot more, you know. Than I would have thought.”

Gerard looks at Patrick over the popsicle. His cheeks hollow out for a second, and then he pulls it out of his mouth with a slurp and Patrick thinks wow, there is no way to eat a popsicle that isn’t totally obscene. “A lot more you know?”

“You know,” says Patrick again.

Gerard puts the popsicle back in his mouth and squints at Patrick for what feels like a really long time. “Yeah,” he says finally, “I guess you could say that he’s…you know.”

Bob and Frankie choose that moment to come over, having apparently run out of things to blast with a high-pressure jet stream. Frankie folds himself into the tiny gap between Gerard and the end of the seat, and Bob stretches out on the grass, pulling his cigarettes out of his pocket.

“How you guys doing?” he asks, lighting one up.

“Oh,” says Gerard, grinning up at the sky. “You know.”

***

Bob wears gray slippers that he leaves outside his bedroom door at night, and the only time Patrick ever sees him get mad is when Pete comes over on Sunday and puts them on to go outside.

Patrick finds Pete sitting at the kitchen table, looking very serious and contrite while Bob holds the slippers up in one hand.

“It’s just, they’re inside shoes, Pete. Inside.”

Pete nods very fast, and opens his mouth to say something disastrous, no doubt, but just then the phone rings and Patrick, after a quick nod from Bob, answers it.

“Hey, man.” Frank. “What’s up? We’re gonna go see a movie, you guys wanna come?”

Patrick explains about the slippers, and has to yank the phone away from his ear when Frank yells this news to Gerard, without covering the phone at his end.

(“Yeah, he’s a pain in the ass,” Bob says fondly, when Patrick bitches at him about this, later. “He’ll come in handy when I’m old and deaf, though.”)

There’s a breathless exclamation and some scuffling noises, and then Gerard’s got the phone and he says, “Pete’s still in one piece, right?”

Patrick rolls his eyes. Everyone is so dramatic. “He’s fine. What movie are you going to see?”

“Because those are *inside shoes*,” Gerard continues, sounding terribly concerned. “Frank wore them outside once and Bob gave him a *wedgie*.”

“Were you in fifth grade at the time?” Patrick glances over at Bob and Pete, who seem to have reached a truce, because Bob is letting Pete show him all the pictures he carries of Hemmy. “I think we’re okay.”

“So are you coming?” Frank again. “Christina Ricci, man. Gee’s gonna violate his restraining order, it’ll be good times.”

“I don’t have to stay two hundred feet away from her *image on screen*,” Gerard says, muffled and sulky.

Patrick looks at Pete, who he knows is going out with his latest girl tonight, and at the picture of My Chem on Bob’s fridge where Mikey, Gerard and Frank are doing weird rapper hands around Ray, who is wearing bunny ears and a long-suffering expression, and he looks at Bob, who is sitting quietly at the table with his hands folded and he says, “No, thanks. We’re good.”

They watch a countdown of the One Hundred Most Embarrassing Celebrity Moments, and Bob doesn’t say a thing about Pete’s famous penis. Patrick doesn’t know how he’s ever going to watch TV with anyone else, ever again.

***

It’s fine, you know. Patrick’s not drawing hearts on his history notes or anything. It’s just a little crush – Bob is smart and funny and cool and Patrick doesn’t think there’s anything wrong with finding those attributes attractive.

He’s not going to *do* anything, Christ. It’ll fizzle out when they go their separate ways and anyway, it’s kind of nice having a crush on someone who is never, ever, ever going to find out. It makes Patrick feel young and sort of stupid, in a happy kind of way.

Pete notices, of course, because Pete is the most irritating person who’s ever lived, but miracle of miracles, he doesn’t say anything to anyone else.

“It’s cute, man”, he says, bumping Patrick’s shoulder as they leave the studio one night. “You and Bob. You’ll like, get married in Bob’s backyard and have super-intelligent, super-blond kids who hate having their picture taken.”

“No-one’s getting married, God.” Patrick holds the door open for Pete. “I just like him, is all.”

“You loooooove him.”

“Shut up.”

“You want to kiiiiiiiiss him.”

“Shut *up*!” Patrick shoves Pete and Pete laughs, grabbing Patrick’s hand for balance.

“Call me later?” he asks, pulling his car keys out of his pocket. “Any time, I’ll pick up. Promise me.”

Patrick promises, and as he watches Pete drive away he wonders how Pete knew he wouldn’t need a ride.

When he arrives at My Chem’s studio, Ray and Frank are halfway out the door.

“Hey guys.” Patrick neatly sidesteps before Ray, absorbed in his PSP, crashes into him. “Good day?”

They chat for a bit about how much they hate and love producers in equal measure, and then Mikey and Gerard wander out, both of them bundled up against the stifling heat.

“Hey!” Gerard hugs Patrick and, because he is apparently less subtle than Pete – who knew? – he waggles his eyebrows and whispers, “Bob’s still in there.”

“Thanks.” Patrick removes himself from Gerard’s layers of wool and does not look at Frankie, who is grinning like even more of a maniac than usual. “Uh. Catch you later.”

Inside, Bob is leaning over his snare, futzing with something and frowning. He looks up when Patrick swings the door open, and his eyebrows lift. “Hey.”

“Hey.” Patrick drops his bag on the floor and wanders over to the kit. “Trouble?”

Bob scratches his head. “I don’t know. Something sounds weird to me. The guys said they don’t hear it, but…” he trails off, looking puzzled.

Patrick gets it, though. Mixing, producing, it’s all the same. You get that ear.

“Want me to try?” he slides in behind the kit, picks up some sticks, not waiting for Bob to say yes or no.

They fiddle around for a while. In the end Patrick is forced to admit defeat – he can’t hear anything wrong, and if that means Bob’s Soundguy Ear is superior to Patrick’s Producer Ear, well, so be it.

Except Bob’s face clears, and he shrugs and says, “I must have imagined it,” like if Patrick says it’s okay, then there’s no need to worry.

Patrick does not know what to make of this. Bob is kind of hanging over his shoulder. He smells really good. “Uh, well. Probably Gerard’s hysteria is contagious, or something.”

Bob smiles a little. “Probably.”

Patrick stands up, but Bob doesn’t move so Patrick has to kind of slide himself out between Bob and the wall, and Bob stops him with a hand on his stomach and says, “Hey.”

“Um,” says Patrick. He’s not prepared for this. Bob’s really close to him. He wishes Pete was here, to make a rude comment or a loud noise and provide some kind of distraction. “Hey.”

“Thanks,” Bob says. His hands are really warm when he places them on either side of Patrick’s neck.

“You’re really blond,” Patrick says, and then immediately resolves never to say anything ever again, but Bob just gives a tiny smile.

“I am many things,” he says in a serious, deep voice, and it makes Patrick laugh and Bob says, “God, your *smile*,” and then they are kissing and Patrick’s whole world narrows down to the way Bob’s lipring feels, pressed against Patrick’s mouth.

“I thought I was being stealth,” Patrick says when Bob pulls away, his lips all pink and just-been-kissed.

Bob does that tiny smile again, the one that makes Patrick want to do all sorts of things inappropriate to their current location. “Yeah.”

He won’t kiss Patrick again, not for lack of effort on Patrick’s part, not in the studio, and he takes *forever* getting ready to leave, and as they head out the doors, Patrick grumbles,

“If you were Pete, you’d make out with me in the studio and damn the consequences.”

“If you were Gerard,” Bob turns out the lights, “You’d want to record it.”

***

Later, when Patrick is lying in Bob’s bed, marveling at the way everything in his bedroom is arranged in perfect right angles, his phone rings.

Bob’s in the kitchen, so Patrick digs through his crumpled clothes (Bob’s are folded neatly on a chair, despite being removed at the same speed) until he finds it. It’s Pete.

“You said you’d call me!” Pete sounds indignant even through his mouthful of Cheetos.

Patrick wonders what it says about him that he can tell what Pete’s eating just by sound alone, and says, “I was going to, God. It’s not even midnight.”

“Did he do it with Bob?” Frankie’s voice swims out of some behind-Pete place. “Was it good? Are they going to do it again? Gerard wants Polaroids, he’s going to do something in oils.”

Patrick hangs up the phone. It rings again immediately and he answers, grinning. “Yes, yes, I hope so, and over my dead body,” he rattles off, and hangs up just as Bob comes back in.

“Yours or mine?” Bob gets back into bed, and Patrick turns his phone off and drops it on the bedside table.

“Both.”

Bob runs his hand up Patrick’s arm, pulls him in close. “What did they want?”

“Oh,” Patrick fits himself along the line of Bob’s body, “You know.”

There are many things that Patrick likes about Bob’s apartment. The big TV, the coffee, the good food, the peace, the quiet, the cleanliness and neatness that he totally ruins, the showers that nobody tries to film.

He does have someone climbing into his bed now, but strangely, he finds he really doesn’t mind all that much. In fact, that might be his favorite thing of all.


End file.
